


Safety In The Shape Of You

by GoldfishForHire



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics), Superman - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Arguments, Established Relationship, M/M, Secret Relationship, SuperBat, Superbat Week, Superbat Week 2020, Superbatweek day 3, non graphic sexual content, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-07-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:14:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25584214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldfishForHire/pseuds/GoldfishForHire
Summary: Clark and Bruce have been together for some time now, but have kept it mostly to themselves. Unfortunately one morning, the Gotham Gazette publishes an article that reveals their secret. They're caught off guard, words are said that shouldn't have been, and they need to figure out how to come together again.
Relationships: Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 12
Kudos: 152





	Safety In The Shape Of You

**Author's Note:**

> For SuperBat Week 2020 Day 3 Prompt: Arguing

Superman and Batman had been in Madrid with the Justice League for the past week and had only returned to Wayne Manor late last night. Clark Kent was there to cover the series of Red Lantern attacks for the Planet and wouldn’t return until the day after tomorrow. Bruce Wayne had taken an impromptu vacation and likely wouldn’t be back for another week. Clark and Bruce had intended to spend these couple of days together just to be in each other’s company without the danger and stresses of their mission. Bruce had even arranged for Damian to stay with Dick at his apartment again so that they could be relieved of the duty of having to keep an ear out for any lurking or sneaking children. 

Bruce slept easily for once and Clark took immense pleasure in kissing him awake again after dawn; Bruce giving in to him only after Clark reminded him that today was meant to be spent in bed so he could fall back asleep again afterward. Bruce’s drawled agreement quickly turned to moans, gasps, and whimpers as Clark retraced some of his favourite paths across the topography of Bruce’s body over and over until the sound of the other man’s heart let Clark know that he was at the limit of his endurance. Bruce interlaced their fingers as Clark pushed him over the edge and then found his own as well. Clark lay beside him, lazily carding his fingers through Bruce’s sweat slicked hair and soaking up the sunlight now pouring over them as Bruce drifted off. He was halfway to dozing himself when Alfred knocked on the bedroom door. Immediately they were both up and alert. Bruce slung a robe over his shoulders and tied it loosely, opening the door to speak quietly with Alfred before the older man took his leave and Bruce turned around with a copy of the Gazette already open to the society pages. 

Clark watched as Bruce’s face clouded over and he raised a hand to rub at his eyes. 

“What is it?”

Bruce wordlessly held the paper out. Clark got up and he glared in grim understanding at the headline: “Millionaire Bruce Wayne Branching Out Beyond Gotham Roots?” The article was topped by two pictures of the two of them together. The first was a grainy photo of him laughing and Bruce smiling at him. Clark remembered it from a walking date they’d had two winters ago, memorable because it had occurred during a rather extended period of relative peace in both of their cities and they had spent the time coming up with increasingly outlandish theories of what they would face when the peace inevitably broke. It had been a pretty secluded area of the state park and Clark hadn’t realized there had been someone close enough to take a picture. The second picture was of him and Bruce at the private beach they’d gone to just this past summer. The Justice League had become aware of a potential threat targeting the southern island of New Zealand and Batman and Superman had gone to check it out. Bruce Wayne had gone on vacation through the island nation with his children, and Clark Kent had used his vacation time officially to go to Smallville to visit Ma and Pa. Who the hell had taken these pictures? And why had they waited until now to do something with them?

Bruce’s voice broke into his thoughts. “There are steps we can take.”

Clark waved him off and paced away. The paper was crumpled in his hand and he turned around, rocking back and letting the wall behind him take his weight as he closed his eyes to try to get a handle on himself. He was a maelstrom inside. Anger, offense, fear, and guilt swirled within him, cycling and mixing almost too fast for even him to grasp onto. Anger and offense because their relationship was no one's but their own. The choices they made with each other was nobody’s business but theirs and those they chose to share it with and who dare these people drag their private moments into their voyeuristic speculations? It was offensive to him as both a person and a journalist. 

Fear because he knew that now that it was out there, it wouldn’t ever not be. Fear because even if their relationship ended, it’s public existence might dog him for the entirety of his career. Fear because this relationship could jeopardize the perception of his objectivity given that he had interviewed and written about both Bruce Wayne and Wayne Enterprises in the past, never mind that he hadn’t done so since they’d been together. Fear because despite how much progress has been made in their society, dating another man could still destroy his career. Fear because it had been going so well and there was so much to lose.

Guilt because he’d never wanted their relationship to be a secret for so long. He was certain that Bruce’s kids knew, detectives that they were, though Bruce had told him that he’d never confirmed it one way or the other. He was pretty sure that his parents and Lois had figured it out. He’d been careful not to say anything too incriminating, but he knew that the way he talked about Bruce had changed. But none of them had ever pressed him to talk about it.

Clark opened his eyes again to see that Bruce had moved. The other man sat in the leather armchair by the unlit fireplace, elbows on his knees and steepled fingers hiding the lower half of his face. He watched Bruce watch him and suddenly couldn’t stand to see the other man look so unaffected. After his initial reaction, Bruce had slipped his emotions behind a calm mask and the barrier of his hands and Clark wanted them brought back out. “How could anyone have taken these photos?”

“I don’t know. There should be very few options that would have been able to slip past you, especially if they didn’t know that they had to hide their surveillance from Kryptonian senses. It shouldn’t take long to cross reference and figure out who -”

“I’m not asking who; I’m asking how.” He was being unfair and he knew it. But Bruce always hid behind objectivity and only let himself react emotionally afterwards if at all. Clark just wanted him to react first for once. He just wanted Bruce to acknowledge that this was a violation; that this hurt. He wanted Bruce to be angry too. “You have sensors and satellites with a thousand capabilities. Why were they able to get photos?”

Bruce huffed a breath. “I’m not Holt, Clark. My ability to shield against technological surveillance isn’t an innate capability. It’s restricted to what I can intentionally create which means it’s limited to threats I know about and can counter. You know that.”

“You don’t have a way to deal with paparazzi? Come on, Bruce.” Bruce’s eyes flashed and Clark felt a flare of vindication even as he knew he was edging closer to crossing a line.

“This isn’t Vikki Vale ambushing me for an interview or some camera outside a coffee shop. It's not the same thing."

"You're right. This isn't a publicity stunt for Brucie Wayne. These are our private memories printed here." He shook the paper in his hand. "This is my name, Bruce. This is my career."

"It doesn't have to be that bad. I told you, there are steps we can take. Options we still have. We can minimize any damage."

"How are we going to do that? We only have two options. Either we out ourselves and reward them for this crap they’ve pulled, or we deny their claims somehow. The photos were doctored or they're from a relationship that has already ended. Neither of those options are good ones. Both options are more than I wanted to give away."

Bruce's head turned to the side and he stared hard at the wall for a moment before looking vaguely over Clark’s shoulder and folding his hands as if he needed to keep them from doing something else. "I'm sorry that you're taking this so hard, but I promise you that it's not as bad as you think. The news cycle -"

"Don't tell me about the damned news cycle, Bruce, I've been working it for decades." Clark snapped. The anger was tremulous in his grasp and he gripped it tighter. He knew it wasn’t fair to unleash it upon Bruce, but it felt safer than anything else he was feeling right now.

"And I've been in it for decades, Clark. I know how to navigate it from the other side. How to mitigate and minimize different parts of a story."

“What’s there to minimize other than the relationship? People are already going to think it’s minimal. They don't take Brucie Wayne seriously so they don't take his dates seriously, but I have spent my entire adult life building my credibility. It's easy to handwave something when it doesn't have to mean anything to you." 

Bruce’s eyes widened with surprise and hurt and Clark felt his anger disintegrate into nothing, leaving just his guilt and fear. It was a long moment before Bruce spoke. “When we first started this, you said that you thought that I would have had plans upon plans for anything that could be the end of us. You were right. And the one factor that was most prevalent was this, right here.”

Clark stared at the crumpled pages in his hand. “The Gazette?”

Bruce closed his eyes. “You. Regretting.”

The breath stole from his chest. Heat burned in his eyes before he managed to suppress it.

"Minimize the relationship. Is that what you want?"

"I -" No. No it wasn't. 

"I know what you've made yourself into. And I know how much you’ve put into it. And I know that I...that I'm just -"

Clark was on his knees in front of the other man before the next breath, cradling his face between his hands. Bruce's eyes didn't open. "Don't you dare. Bruce Thomas Wayne, I don't know what you were going to call yourself but don't you dare say it in front of me."

He knew that he’d been pushing so hard for Bruce’s anger to avoid acknowledging that he wouldn’t find it. Bruce was angry about the way the story had come out, there was no doubt about that. But Bruce wasn’t angry that it came out. Clark leaned forward and pressed his forehead to Bruce’s. It was true that it took some doing to get Bruce to acknowledge what someone meant to him. But it was just as true that they had passed that milestone a long time ago. He knew that Bruce would have preferred his kids to know, to see, to use the words that they were and that it was only his own boundaries that kept their relationship as much an unspoken truth as it was. But Bruce had never condemned him for it. Bruce had never shamed him for how slow he'd needed to take it. Even with their first kiss, disaster though it had nearly been because of how he'd mishandled it, Bruce had never blamed him.

Clark was fiercely protective of his privacy and the privacy of those he cared for and built relationships with. This meant that Clark was much slower than most people with regard to surpassing different relationship milestones. Part of it was because of the nature of what he was and the necessity of keeping himself safe. Part of it here was because he just didn’t want to deal personally with any of the prejudice. He didn’t think that anyone he knew would react badly, but he didn’t want to be proven wrong. Part of it too, he had to assume, was simply because of who he was. It had taken him ten years to even ask Lois out on a date after all.

But part of it, perhaps paradoxically, was because of how lucky in love he had been. He and Lois had gone from respected colleagues, to friends, to lovers, to spouses, and back to good friends. Probably best friends. Their passion and love for each other had had such a strong foundation and it had kept them going through so many trials. So many confrontations with her father, through the shock and violation of Kon’s conception, into the wonder and tragedy of New Krypton, and even during the joys of bringing Chris into their lives and then the subsequent loss in his absence. They still loved each other and probably always would. But somewhere along the way, they had stopped being in love with each other. They were both journalists, both truth seekers, and once they started seeing the signs in themselves and each other, they’d sat down and had some very long, very hard talks. But in the end, they’d walked out of that courthouse, divorce papers in hand, and had both still been so proud of their marriage even though it had ended.

If Clark called it a relationship, he could even count towards the end of high school when he, Lana, and Pete had tried to build something between themselves even as they were growing apart. That hadn’t ended in a successful relationship, barely edging out of the friends-with-benefits territory, but it had made their friendship stronger. It had helped them through a time of such significant change that came from two of them leaving Smallville for bigger dreams and from one staying behind to plant his own. 

But increasingly, he’s kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. For him to lose in love, or to lose someone he loved. Most people weren’t so lucky in love. Bruce hadn’t been so lucky in love. From the professional distance and crossed lines with Vicki Vale, to the tragedy and exploitation of Vesper Fairchild, to the shock and loneliness after Selina Kyle, to the guilt and complexity with Sasha Bordeaux, and to the fledgling hope and subsequent long lasting grief of Harvey Dent; Bruce had lost and lost and lost in love. But he still opened both his heart and his home to Clark. Clark had always known it, and had said it more than once: Bruce was braver than he was.

The more he thought about it though, the more he thought that maybe he was looking at it wrong. Bruce might not have had the same types of relationships as Clark, but his life was still filled with love. His children and Alfred. His and their friends. And for all Clark had been fortunate in romantic and close emotional relationships, he’d also spent so much time feeling and being so lonely and isolated. Perhaps they were both unlucky. Perhaps they were both lucky.

He slid his hands down to Bruce’s shoulders and pressed a kiss to his temple. “I’m sorry.”

Bruce jerked his shoulders and tried to lean back. At the beginning of their relationship, Clark had assumed that Bruce did these sorts of things because he wanted Clark to stop touching him. Because he wanted space. But he’d come to learn that Bruce did them when he was feeling vulnerable. When he was reaching a point when he couldn’t hide it or brush it off. Bruce didn’t do it as an order, he gave it as an out. Clark didn’t take it; he held on with both hands. After a moment, Bruce slumped forward.

“This doesn’t have to be anything bad, Clark. It doesn’t even have to be anything at all.”

“Yeah, I know. I believe you.” Clark took a breath and didn’t even try to disguise how shaky it was. “I’m sorry. For everything I said. It was cruel. I was just afraid, though I know that doesn’t justify it. I wasn’t ready. This wasn’t...this isn’t how I wanted this to happen.”

Bruce leaned forward and pressed his forehead against Clark’s shoulder. “I know. I’m sorry that it did.”

“We can deal with this. I know we can. But later, okay? Right now I just want to take you back to bed.” Clark smiled at Bruce’s laughter. “We’ll spend the day how we planned. But maybe for dinner...we can have the kids all over? They’re all likely to have seen the article, and I know you would want them to know. I know you’ve been wanting them to know.”

Bruce was quiet for a moment. “I don’t want you to feel pressured. I know it might seem overwhelming right now, and like you have to have this conversation with everyone, but if you’re still not ready, that’s still okay.”

Clark shook his head. “I should call my folks, too. I want to call them. I don’t know if I’m ready to tell them about it, but I do know that I want to talk to them about it. I want to talk to them about you. I want you and your kids to be able to talk about us, and me.”

Bruce’s hands settled on his hips. “Are you sure?”

Clark took another deep breath, this one much steadier than the last. “Yeah. I may still be a little nervous about it, but I don’t care who knows it. Anywhere you are is everywhere I want to be.”

Bruce huffed. “You’re a corny asshole.”

Clark turned his head and grinned into Bruce’s hair. “I’m a corn-fed asshole.”

Bruce groaned and Clark laughed. One of the things that inevitably came up when people were discussing Superman was the fact that he was so strong and powerful that he always had to be so careful with everything in order to make sure that he never broke or damaged anything. Those people were half right. He was strong and powerful. He did need to be careful. But they were half wrong, too. He wasn’t always as careful as he should be. Sometimes he was selfish and shortsighted too. Clark slid his hands into Bruce’s robe and ran them up and down his back, feeling the last traces of Bruce’s tension still lingering. Sometimes Clark broke and damaged things. Like people. Like trust. Like feelings. But he always did his best to make amends. And maybe that was good enough.

Clark pulled back just enough to press another kiss to Bruce’s temple. “I love you.” He said.

Bruce sighed and wrapped one arm around Clark’s waist and pushed the other hand into Clark’s hair and held on as tightly as he could. ‘I love you’ Bruce meant.


End file.
